Organization dynamics of AKP in the urban periphery: The case of Sanayi Neighborhood

This thesis explores the local party organization of the ruling Justice and Development Party (JDP) in Sanayi neighborhood, which is one of the oldest working-class slums of Istanbul. During the last decade, JDP has achieved to maintain its solid basis in social space. Especially, the party has considerably gained the consent of urban local populations with low socio-economic status. Nevertheless, most of the recent studies on the JDP narrowly focus on the social and economic policies, ideological-identity codes of the party, the charismatic leadership (or Erdogan) or contextual developments. These studies neglect the party organization itself as a social relationship. Therefore, the neglected subject of local political processes constitutes the point of departure for this research. First of all, this thesis outlines the social-political history and class composition of the neighborhood. Considering this background, this thesis will explore the party's formation process and its place in local political space. Then, the thesis will investigate how the party mobilizes the local actors (or intermediaries) and how the party carries its political agenda among the local population of neighborhood through the intermediaries. This thesis argues that, despite the widespread claim of mass party organization, the party is only accessible to "distinguished" groups and its organization entails ethnic and sectarian boundaries. The party constitutes political relationships that favor the "distinguished" actors and, therefore, endorses social inequalities. Furthermore, this thesis argues that, at the local level, the party establishes a privileged space of opportunities and sources, such as the municipality, and works through power relationships and antagonisms. Thereby, the research analyzes the class-based, cultural and symbolic transformations of the diverse local social groups through the party networks. This thesis dwells on stories of various social classes such as the local capitalists, lower-classes, women, youth and micro-entrepneurs. The political attitudes and positioning of these groups with respect to the party will be depicted. The theoretical framework of the research is mainly based on the Bourdieu's political space conceptualization and related concepts of capital, strategy, habitus and illisuo. As a matter of fact, this thesis argues that, behind the popular consent given to the JDP, there is widespread organization among the urban localities and "ordinary" local social actors who are mobilized by and loyal to the party. Keywords: Sanayi neighborhood, JDP, local politics, party actors, space theory, Bourdieu